Haha that's funny, when they were doing a stream with Rev4games the other day, I mentioned in chat that they hadn't said much about MP, and David said "that's weird, we just did a thing on MP with Gamespot the other day". Apparently he didn't realize it hadn't been posted yet...
Really interesting to hear their respective attitudes on it. David sounds pretty dismissive of us multiplayer munchkins. Gotta disagree w him -- good MP is certainly less predictable, but that doesn't mean it's less rational. You just have to be more flexible and adaptive, which I find ultimately more interesting and challenging than playing a game where you know what you're going to do 100 turns from now. There is still certainly an element of predicting what your opponent is going to do -- like he said, he knew Miller's playstyle well enough to predict his moves -- but better players will simply be less predictable (just as better AI is less predictable). And ultimately, people who make the best, most rational decisions still usually win at Civ. (Well, that or whoever drops last...)
As to the actual MP experience in BE:
1. The combat sounds straight-up awesome. So many new ways to build and use an army. Combat in MP sounds like it will blow anything in SP out of the water -- it's really the best part of MP, because AI, no matter how good it is, will never match humans in tactics. It'll be awesome to play against players that make full use of the range of units, affinity upgrades, perks, and tactical styles.
2. I like the change to make hybrid the central turn mechanic. You don't really need sequential during peaceful turns (except for stuff like stealing resource pods... but who really cares about that). MP warfare OTOH has to be played sequential to have any real element of strategy -- that's where you can make actual tactical decisions, and its where humans really shine vs. playing AI.
3. That said... it's all going to depend on whether they've improved the playability of hybrid. They absolutely need to give off-turn players something to do -- you need to be able to see your opponents actually moving and fighting in your field of view, and/or have access to your various panels to plan out your next turn. You can't just be sitting there reading a book -- everyone will hate that and people just won't play MP.
4. Not sure if they will make full simultaneous an option... but I kind of hope they don't, at least at first, to try and encourage people to give the new hybrid a try. Again, assuming they've actually made hybrid more playable, I think it will ultimately be more fun.
5. Glad to hear they've changed the points system. Nothing made less sense in Civ than that the highest-score player was always the one who built the most early-game wonders. Hopefully scores will more accurately reflect who's actually ahead now -- that'll be good for both MP and SP.
6. Kind of interesting they made points affect turn order. I'm a little concerned that will make it more difficult for lower score players to attack higher score players -- and if you're focusing on military you're bound to have the lower score. Hopefully if you make a DoW you will get the first turn of combat decisions, to have that surprise attack/preemptive DoW defense element. And hopefully, DoWs won't mean one turn of simultaneous combat, like they do in Civ5 hybrid... that's just weird.
Between the gameplay, balancing and online stability changes, I think they've got the makings of a really interesting strategic and tactical MP game here that could be more fascinating and fun than any Civ to date. Now just gotta hope the execution lives up to the promise...
